Alberta and the oil boom are virtually synonymous. Those who study history may know that more than 500 oil companies emerged in Turner Valley following the start of the operation of the first well in 1914.

What they may not know is how shady oil tycoons – charlatans like George Edward Buck – profited from the Turner Valley boom’s wide publicity by misleading investors and engaging in other unscrupulous activities.

In The Boom: Oil, Popular Culture, and Politics in Alberta, 1912–1924, Paul Chastko, an associate professor of history at the University of Calgary, profiles Buck and other figures who were led by greed while Alberta’s oil culture was in its early days.

The Boom is not the book that Chastko originally set out to write. He had been working on a broader project related to Alberta’s politics and oil culture when he decided that he needed to go back and include the first big boom: Turner Valley in 1914.

“At most,” he explains, “I figured I would get part of a chapter out of the material. While going through the digitized newspaper collection at the University of Calgary libraries, I stumbled across a few ads for Black Diamond Oil Fields that were really striking for their tone and confidence, so I started looking up other articles on George Buck, the owner of the company, and the stories became increasingly colourful and outrageous.”

Chastko realized that he had discovered a compelling story that needed to be told.

“In many ways, this is the ‘origin story’ of Alberta’s petroleum culture that takes place well before the Leduc discovery in 1947 and where Calgarians, in the words of one reporter, took to oil ‘like a wino to the bottle.’”

He explains the essential elements of this culture: “Despite the vicious boom and bust cycle of the oil patch, Albertans made a conscious choice to pursue developing an oil industry dominated by independent producers and wildcatters because it accorded with the province’s entrepreneurial spirit and individualist beliefs.”

While a scholarly book, The Boom also appeals to a broader audience. “For academics, it offers a discussion of how petroleum culture has influenced and shaped public attitudes, perceptions, and beliefs in the province. But I hope that the book has crossover appeal to a general audience that wants to hear a good story and maybe find out a little bit more about Alberta and the oil industry along the way,” Chastko says.

The Boom will give readers a nuanced understanding of Alberta’s early oil industry. “Rather than simply celebrating the big successes, it digs into the chaotic mix of ambition, hype, and even a bit of the fraud that characterized the first oil boom in Turner Valley,” Chastko explains.

“By spotlighting figures like George Buck, the book reveals how these under-the-radar characters and risky ventures helped shape Alberta’s oil culture.”

Alberta’s oil story is complex. “It’s not just about drilling and discovery – it’s about people, politics, culture, and the choices made along the way,” says Chastko.

“And understanding that complexity is crucial, especially as we navigate current debates about energy and the environment.”

Together with this understanding, Chastko hopes readers “come away with new questions about how we got here – and where we might be headed next.”